I have been preparing for the new sat and I there aren’t a lot of prep materials. I have been considering preparing for the ACT as there are a lot more review materials.
I had a couple of questions regarding the ACT:
Are the old tests ( from maybe 5 yrs ago) still valid? Are the recent changes in the ACT significant enough to deem these test not as useful?
What are the best prep materials, books, or courses for the ACT?
Should I go ahead prepare for both the SAT and the ACT?
The old tests are still useful. The only difference now is that there is 1 double passage in the reading section where you analyze 2 passages and see how they compare. The best prep materials are the red book and the resources from CrackACT. You can prepare mostly for the ACT since the tests are so similar and there’s more resources available for the ACT.
I used the 2014 Barron’s ACT book to prepare for my ACT last October and got a 36. Not saying that book was the reason, but there are tons of great review books. Old tests are still great to use because the recent changes to the ACT in 2015 did not impact the material you need to know. It was something about score reporting and the information included in the reports. As for taking both the SAT and the ACT, I would say it depends on where you want to go. If you’re looking at very selective schools I would suggest taking both. I took them two weeks apart, and I think my studying for the ACT helped me on the SAT and vice versa. Good luck!
Can someone explain what the ACT red book is? Is it the official book? I did a Google search and came up with different results.
@STEM2017 The ACT red book includes real ACT tests and were made by the creators of ACT. There’s different versions but the most recent one is the Official ACT Prep Guide 2016-2017.
^thank you!